Hi Peter,
Your wife is a down to earth smart woman. C.frenchi mostly build their nest in a tree and these dopey ones have, it seems, mistaken your home for a tree. If it is a nest (with a queen inside the mass) there doesn’t seem to be any reason to try and force-feed them bait to take to their nest — it’s right there! So, remove it. Another option is for the pest man to use say Termidor dust powdered all through the mud mass — or Termidor foam — followed by a six months later inspection to see if they have headed into adjoining timbers of the house.

And lastly, as these termites are usually tree dwellers, it is a good idea to drill holes into nearby trees about shoulder high and if there’s a nest inside, flood it with insecticide as shown on our website.

Your wife is going to say “I told you so”

Hoping this helps, Ion

My pest controller has found a nest of coptotermes frenchi (using infra-red imaging) inside our house. It’s 3/4 the way up inside the wall in the ensuite bathroom. He’s been baiting for 4 months now and every time the covering is opened (right at the nest on the wall), we find that the small opening (drill holed) where the bait is introduced, is covered with mud, effectively blocking the entry to the bait. It’s as though the workers are so smart and worked it out that their front door is knocked down every month during inspection, that within the 5 minutes of the hole been opened up again, they close it up with mud as soon as they can. I also have a feeling that they don’t like the taste of this bait (Nemesis). I’ve read that this particular species is very fickle and timid, but I didn’t know they can be this intelligent as to avoid the bait all together. Is it true that given the bait is properly prepared and changed regularly, they may just decide not to like the taste of it? Or am I just a typical and frustrated owner, who has less patience than the experts? Well, it is my house afterall and the thought of been outsmart by the termites month-by-month whilst they continue to chew down the house is absolutely heart-breaking. My wife can’t understand why they can’t just take the whole nest out with spray. If the queen is eliminated, doesn’t it mean the end of the colony?

Peter.